The drama triangle is a pattern of conflict in which people swap between three roles, victim, persecutor and rescuer, so that a quarrel draws more and more people in and never resolves. The model comes from the psychiatrist Stephen Karpman, working in Eric Berne’s Transactional Analysis. In Therapeutic Shamanism it is a middle-worldMiddle-world. Ordinary physical reality together with its energetic layers: the realm of individuality, separation and mixed intentions, and the only realm where harm is possible. “If there is a hell, then it is the middle-world.” Read the full answer game played by children rather than Adults, never found in the Lower-WorldLower-World. The realm of Mother Earth: pure, unspoilt, wild nature, with no technology and no agriculture. Home of the Peoples and of our own Soul, and completely safe: feeling threatened in a journey is a reliable sign of not having reached it. Read the full answer or Upper-WorldUpper-World. The realm of Father Sky and of Spirit: spacious, rarefied and clear, layered in tiers, offering not escape but perspective. Not better than the Lower-World: we ascend rooted, and bring the gifts back down. Read the full answer, and it ends only when people find the courage to put their grievances down and walk away from it.
Where does the idea of the drama triangle come from? #
From psychotherapy. The term comes from Transactional Analysis, the therapy developed by Eric Berne, and the triangle was first described by one of Berne’s students, the psychiatrist Stephen Karpman.1 Karpman created the model in the late 1960s and published his first paper on it in 1968; since then it has been taken up by coaches, therapists, trainers and HR professionals around the world.2
In its general use the three roles run roughly like this. The persecutor bullies, controls, criticises or belittles. The victim is on the receiving end, or believes they are, and takes it to heart. The rescuer charges in to sort things out, often in a way that is more about looking or feeling good than doing good, and that can leave the person rescued as helpless as before. Writers on the model stress that these are roles people play rather than what people are; the writer and trainer Chris West, in his book The Karpman Drama Triangle Explained, points out that sticking one of the three labels on someone is itself a kind of persecution.2
How does a drama triangle work? #
It spins. Someone feels they are the victim, and that someone else is persecuting them. A third person steps in to rescue the victim, often by turning on the persecutor. Now the persecutor feels like the victim, and sees the rescuer as a persecutor. More people get sucked in, and the whole thing escalates out of control.3
The roles keep changing hands, but one feeling stays the same. By the end, everyone in the triangle feels aggrieved, and everyone feels they are the real victim. Each side believes the other should apologise and that an apology would settle things. Believing that is what keeps a drama triangle going.3
How much harm can a drama triangle do? #
A lot, and at every scale. The drama triangle destroys communities and rips families apart. It can be passed on for generations, even centuries. It can operate on a mass scale as well, in conflicts such as those in the Middle East, Northern Ireland and the Balkans, the Cold War and religious conflicts the world over.4 See What are ancestral burdens and how are they passed down?
How does a drama triangle end? #
Not by the other side apologising. A drama triangle only stops when people within it have the courage to put their grievances down and stop looking for things like apologies, justice or retribution. That is the immense thing Nelson Mandela did on his release from prison, and what people did in the Truth and Reconciliation process that followed in South Africa. People doing the same helped bring the Troubles in Northern Ireland to an end.5
If one person stops playing the blame-game and the others follow, the cycle can end. Sometimes not everyone is able or willing to do that. Even so, anyone caught in a drama triangle always has the option of walking away from it. Others can carry on playing if they wish; that is their responsibility and their choice. Whatever they decide, each of us can still choose not to play any more.5 See What is the forgiveness trap?
Why is it called a game for children, not Adults? #
Because none of the qualities of a true Adult fit with it. An Adult is willing to see things as they are, rather than how they would like them to be or think they “should” be. They take responsibility for their own choices, actions, feelings and behaviour. They step into their own power and authority and do not hand it over to others, which includes not expecting other people to make them feel better or to put things right for them. They set healthy boundaries, own their mistakes and learn from them, use their power wisely, contribute to the community and act for the greater good when it is needed. Put those qualities beside the triangle and it becomes clear that it is “a game played by children, not by Adults”.6
“Adult” here does not mean grown-up in years. In Therapeutic Shamanism it means a person who has truly grown up psychologically, and such people are rarer than they should be. See What does it mean to become a True Adult?
What place does the drama triangle have in a healthy group? #
None. Among the Patterns that describe how healthy groups work, one is that the drama triangle is not a game people play. Drama triangles poison groups and have to be stopped, or better still never allowed to develop in the first place. Stopping them is often the role of the EldersElder (True Elder). The rarer stage beyond Adulthood. Adults decide; Elders advise. More about this, people old and wise enough to put their own grievances aside, see what is good for the group as a whole, and rein in younger, hotter heads.7 See What makes a healthy group or tribe? and What is an Elder?
Is the drama triangle found in the Lower-World? #
No. It is a middle-world game, and it is not played in the Lower-World Tribe, anywhere else in the Lower-World, or in the Upper-World. But we are surrounded by it in this world, so, like our other wounded experiences of human relationships, it can discolour and distort what we experience in the Lower-World. That is why it matters to be aware of it, and as far as possible not to take it with us when we go to meet the Lower-World Tribe.8
No true Lower-World or Upper-World GuideGuides. The Lower-World and Upper-World beings a practitioner works with and learns from, of whom the Power Animal is the first and foremost. True Guides are ethical to their core; the shaman’s power comes from the depth of these bonds, not from the shaman. More about this will help anyone play the drama triangle. What they can and will do, if asked, is help us walk away from one, help with any healing we need in order to do that, and show us healthier ways of being.8 See What is the Lower-World Tribe?
